Norway in a Nutshell

Yesterday, I came to an important conclusion: this will not be my last visit to Norway. Although the nutshell tour was fantastic, I realized how little of the incredible wilderness I have seen.

But, to return to the beginning of the tour, which had 5 parts:

1. 8:11-12:53 Train from Oslo train station to Myrdal. As far as train rides go, this one was amazing, to say the least. Although the scenery at the beginning was fairly normal for Norway, as we got closer to Myrdal, it got much better. The best views (and most of my pictures) were of picturesqe valleys surrounded by tree-lined mountains. We also passed by a number of Norwegian towns, which was interesting mostly because all the houses were basically variations on a theme! In the larger cities this isn't true, but everywhere else they only need a couple colors of paint since everyone seems to choose the same few. Interestingly, for lunch I brought a barbeque chicken and coleslaw sandwich from the grocery store that was actually quite good. Now that's a combination I've yet to find in the US...

2. 13:27-14:25 Flåmsbana train from Myrdal to Flåm. This ride continued the excellent scenery from the last one, although we often went through tunnels. The best part was this great waterfall that they had built a deck by so they stopped the train so everyone could go out and take pictures. Before we got out though, the conductor mentioned something about a mythical lady that lived in the waterfall. Then, while everyone was out of the train they started playing some mysterious music. So at this point I thought "oh they're just trying to set the mood" and didn't think any more of it. Then a minute later, a woman came out of this little brick shack up high by the waterfall and started dancing around to the music. Clearly they were attempting to play up the mystical lady thing, but it ended up being pretty funny (and tacky at the same time, of course)!

3. 15:10-17:20 Flåm-Gudvangen Fjord Cruise. This was definitely my favorite part of the nutshell tour. Although it was raining and quite windy, the undescribable scenery made it definitely worth standing on the outside deck of the boat. I took many pictures, but they don't even really do the Nærøyfjord justice.
Oddly enough, at this point most of the people on the tour were now Japanese. I wouldn't have imagined Norway being that popular of a place form them to travel to, but I guess I was wrong. The majority of travelers to Norway are actually German (as according to a tour guide) and some museums actually translate descriptions into German along with English. But anyway, back to the tour...

4. 17:45-19:00 Gudvangen to Voss via bus. There was some good scenery on the bus, but it was fairly similar to that from the train trips. The bus did have to make a bunch of u-turns to get down the mountainside, which elicited a gasp from the entire bus as soon as we could see what we would be driving down. All I can say is that I was incredibly glad I wasn't driving.

5. 19:20-20:35 Voss to Bergen via train. The scenery here was also good but nothing compared to the earlier parts of the trip. I ended up taking a nap since I was tired even though I didn't technically do much of anything.

After arriving in Bergen, I found the place where I was staying with a little trouble since Google maps evidently hasn't quite put all of Bergen's streets into their database. But I found some free wireless and got a different map that led me to where I needed to go. Yet again, having an iPod touch was clearly the best investment I could have made to prepare for this trip.

Although the Norway in a Nutshell tour was an excellent way to taste what Norway has to offer, it doesn't offer any chance to get out and actually explore. If I were to do it again, I would probably stop at one of the many towns along the fjord where you could undoubtedly hike into the surrounding mountains. For people whom hiking wouldn't be a good option though, this is the right trip to take from Oslo to Bergen.

I'll detail all about my time in Bergen tomorrow since it's already midnight here...

Last Day in Oslo

In case you were wondering, the laundry worked out ok! I guess the settings I chose were just fine after all.

Anyways, after that was finished yesterday, I met my friend Casey, who is studying at BI (a business school) this semester. She showed me around her school, which was a very contemporary building that I was really impressed with. We then went to the Bogdoy part of Oslo to the Kon-Tiki museum which was about these two boats, the Kon-Tiki and Ra II. This Norwegian guy built both boats in order to prove that different ancient civilizations could have had contact with each other. He was convinced that they had contact because of the many similarities between cultures. Both of the boats were on display, which was neat to see.

We then went back to prepare apple crisp for a dinner with a bunch of the international students. Everyone brought a dish from their country and we all shared - it was very tasty. It was also fun learning about some of the differences between different cultures.


Today, I went back to the Bogdoy part of Oslo by ferry to see the Viking Ship Museum. They had two complete boats - one that was more of a luxury boat and one that would likely have been used to cross the seas. The luxury boat was a burial spot for a Queen, so there were a number of items like wagons and cookware on display as well (it is thought that the Vikings believed in the afterlife, thus the need for items with the burial boat).

I then took another boat to one of the islands near Oslo. This was a bit interesting, as I didn't really have any clue if I was getting on the right boat, how often it ran to the islands, or which island to get off at. Luckily, I chose a great island to explore since it was fairly good sized and there weren't many people living there. I have a bunch of pictures that I will upload as soon as I can.

While waiting for the boat to return, it of course started pouring rain. There wasn't any shelter nearby, so I definitely got wet. But as the saying goes, "there's no such thing as bad weather, just innapropriate clothing," which conveniently rhymes in Norwegian.

Tomorrow I'm going on the Norway in a Nutshell tour to Bergen, so hopefully I make all the connections between transportation methods!

Laundry

This morning I realized that I would need to do laundry. Luckily, the hostel I'm staying at has an agreement with a nearby hotel that we can use their facilities. It cost 60 kr for two loads, which is about $10.

The unfortunate part is that the machines are labelled in Norwegian. So, I put both loads in at 60 degrees Celsius and we'll see what happens.

There were instructions in English for the dryers, however. One of the settings is called 'mangle dry 25%.' I think I'll choose a different setting.

Oslo, part 1

Today, I started off with a typical Oslo activity - walking along Karl Johans gate, which is a main street in downtown Oslo. I was doing Rick Steve's walking tour, which also stopped at a couple of places along the way.

However, the tour didn't include anything too exciting, especially since the city hall was closed until September 21st to visitors. So, I decided that since it wasn't raining too bad (just kind of misting, which was most of today) I would go see Frogner Park. The statues by Vigeland were very cool to see and the park itself was nice too.

I then went to the Nobel Peace Center and museum, which was much more interesting than I expected. They had an exhibit with a bunch of pictures and stories about people who were seeking asylum in Norway or other counties and some of the difficulties they have to go through. There was also a large exhibit about the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize winner, Martti Ahtisaari, who was the president of Finland and is now an international peace mediator. One of the things he is well known for is for negotiating the independance of Kosovo.

I have also made some general observations about Norway:
- Everything is ridiculously expensive. I knew that it would be more than France, but I didn't realize by how much. What I can't figure out is why - I've heard it's since there are many very wealthy people in Oslo, but I also can't imagine that is why a 700 mL (about 24oz) bottle of water costs $4.50 (and water fountains, like in France, are nearly impossible to find).
-Convenience stores are very popular. Actually, this gets kind of out of hand. The chain Narvesen has stores all over the place, often in close proximity to one another. However, unlike Walgreens, they sell mostly food and that's about it. 7-eleven stores are also common, but they don't sell gas, just food as well.
-Theft must be quite a problem, since almost all stores have those alarm gates when you exit. Maybe if things didn't cost quite so much this wouldn't be a big issue?
-Everyone speaks English. I'm sure there are some Norwegians that don't, but I certainly haven't seen them. This does make things much easier travel-wise, that's for sure.

Off to Norway!

This morning I went to Les Halles (a park) until I had to go to the airport for my flight to Norway. The flight was out of terminal 1, which really wasn't a very nice part of the airport as they had many flights crammed into a very small space. When I was about to board my SAS flight to Oslo, they scanned the boarding pass I had and it didn't work. I was towards the head of the boarding line and there was only space for one person to board people to the flight and it took them like 10 minutes to figure out that I was supposed to be on the flight. And after I got on, of course there was someone already in my seat. In the end it was fine since economy was only about 2/3 full anyway.

I didn't have much of a lunch, so I bought a hot dog since it was the cheapest item I could choose. After calculating the exchange rate, it turns out that a single hot dog cost $6. Ouch. After that, I went straight for the Anker hostel, which hopefully will be fine for the time I am here. Tomorrow I will begin exploring Oslo, so I will write again once I have seen more of the city!

The First Couple of Days

Hello everyone! I have decided to write a blog about my experiences since that will be the easiest way for me to share them. However, I'm not sure how often I will be able to update the blog for the first month since I'm not sure when I will or will not have internet access. Also. if I continue to type these on french keyboards (where the a and q, w and z, ? and m, among other keys have switched places. Also, please forgive me for any spelling errors, as the spellcheck only seems to know french.

Anyways, the flight over here on Air France was very good. The airplane was moderately new, the crew spoke both french and english very fluently, and the pasta dinner was actually pretty good. My only complaint was that there weren't any air vents and the plane got kind of hot so that wasn't very comfortable. I did manage to sleep but I'm not exactly sure for how long. After the flight arrived, I had to wait about a half hour to get through immigration since there was a pretty long line. Luckily customs didn't pull me over to check my baggage so that made the process a bit quicker. I then took a taxi to the place where I stored my two large bags for the month before school starts on the 21st of September. I had a bit of trouble locating the baggage place since it was on a pedestrian only side street, but luckily I had downloaded a map of Paris to my iPod touch before I came so I used that to figure out where I needed to go.

I then checked in at the hotel FIAP Jean Monnet, which so far has been ok. It's in a very residental area, so there aren't many things nearby, but there is a Franprix (a Walgreens size grocery store) so I can purchase items for a quick meal if I want. After that I took a nap since I was quite tired, and pretty much didn't do much else the rest of the evening.


Today (8/25) I started off by going to the Pompidou center, which turned out to be closed. That ended up being ok since it wasn't too hard to get to my second choice - La Défense and the Grande Arche. La défense is the business area of Paris, and it is somewhat similar to downtown Minneapolis. La Grande Arche is a large white arch that is the main attraction in the area. I took the glass elevator to the top of the arch and there was a pretty good view of the Champs-Elysee since they are along the same line. I then went to the Tuileries gardens (right next to the Louvre) and did some people watching and rested for a little while. After that I went to the St. Eustache church which had some good stained glass windows and was fairly cool inside.

I do have pictures of most of this, however without my computer I can't upload them. I'm off to Norway tomorrow, so I'll write more after that!